To all of our young drivers

[menendez1293]

Originally Posted by FenwickHockey65

Probably has his temporary. At least I hope.

correct

[bigearl]

My daughter turns 16 in June and I hate reading crap like this because it scares me. I think she's pretty responsible, but I can see her getting in a car with someone else who is easily distracted. I want to design a car that blocks all cell phone signals in or out except for home and 911 and fill in all the seats except the driver seat with expanding foam.

[2000v6]

Originally Posted by bigearl

My daughter turns 16 in June and I hate reading crap like this because it scares me. I think she's pretty responsible, but I can see her getting in a car with someone else who is easily distracted. I want to design a car that blocks all cell phone signals in or out except for home and 911 and fill in all the seats except the driver seat with expanding foam.

Wonder who would fund that little science experiment gone wrong.

[2000v6]

I mean in a way sure darwin's law is in effect, people unfortunately don't really start to think until they are at least 20. It's the way that the hormones and brain develop. While testosterone production starts kicking in, the brain is pretty much in a stale mate until it's at least 20 years old for some stupid reason.

[bigearl]

Originally Posted by 2000v6

Wonder who would fund that little science experiment gone wrong.

LOL no one would fund it-I didn't actually mean it. Just pointing out that I'm nervous about the whole teen driving thing since I'm staring it straight in the eye for my own child.

[FenwickHockey65]

I once got a call on my phone while driving and figured I could answer it.

I was dead wrong. Almost wasn't able to turn sharply enough at an intersection and nearly took out a Nissan Versa. I basically dropped my phone at the last minute and pulled hard to the right and made the turn.

I've never touched my phone while driving since that day.

[2000v6]

Originally Posted by FenwickHockey65

I once got a call on my phone while driving and figured I could answer it.

I was dead wrong. Almost wasn't able to turn sharply enough at an intersection and nearly took out a Nissan Versa. I basically dropped my phone at the last minute and pulled hard to the right and made the turn.

I've never touched my phone while driving since that day.

That's what the bluetooth headsets are forth, I know that the majority of people driving with them look stupid but it's worth it

[FenwickHockey65]

Originally Posted by 2000v6

That's what the bluetooth headsets are forth, I know that the majority of people driving with them look stupid but it's worth it

I own one but I don't remember the code to pair it with my phone. It was from my old phone.

[lil_chef]

i think just as bad are the kids i see on campus driving while listening to music.....





on there MP3 players............................ what the hell people, thats what the radio is for!

[Xanthos]

Originally Posted by CamaroSkooter

I read the link as, "car crashes leading cause of teen death sinus," and was like, huh?

I got it now

But in all seriousness, is this statistic really all that shocking to people? I don't mean to sound insensitive here, but isn't this just another "bleeding hearts" vs. "survival of the fittest" struggle?

Let me preface this by saying, I can't even begin to imagine the pain and suffering that a parent goes through when losing a child, and I wouldn't wish that on anyone.

But, statistically speaking, kids are going to do the stupidest things and in the end their survival depends on how stupid they want to act. Yes, there are always situations where a child dies and it's not attributed to them doing something dumb and that is truly tragic. But the overwhelming majority of teens that die in car crashes are the results of poor decision making, probably due to (and this is just my opinion here) a lack of parental oversight.

We're never going to see a teen mortality rate of zero (meaning every child survives their teens), but that doesn't stop these bleeding hearts from thinking they can enact laws or regulations that will attempt to attain that.

At some point you've got to say, "enough is enough," and recognize that there's only so much you can do to prepare people for the grim reality of life. This whole culture of "let's-put-warning-labels-on-everything" is starting to drive this country stupid.
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Hmm...I didn't realize I was so passionate about the subject. [/rant]

Originally Posted by Unfair

Darwin's law?

Even if you really feel this way, car crashes usually involve other people. Survival of the Fittest doesn't mean "Survival of those lucky enough to not be in the way of the not fit."

The other day I got a phone call from a survey company asking me if I thought the government was too lax or too strict on safety standards for cars. I told them point blank that I thought the government was going about things the wrong way. I believe that we need to be more strict on driver's education. The whole 16 vs 18 debate is pointless because really, we're not that much more mature at 18 than we are at 16. You want mature drivers, restrict the driving age to 25. But then you'll end up with a bunch of inexperienced 25 year olds.

What we need to do (in my opinion) is toughen our education requirements. When I got my license, drivers ed was not mandatory. And most of the people who did take driver's ed took it through a local driving school (that will remain unnamed). Thats where most of my friends got their driver's ed. The thing is, though - apparently in the entire course you were only required to have about 15 hours of on the road practice. I was shocked when I found that out. I got my driver's ed through a state issued home-taught driver's ed program, and by the time I finished the program I had almost 200 hours on the road and easily double that in classroom instruction (books and videos and whatnot). I passed the drivers test on the first try with a 97%, but very few of my friends passed with higher than an 80% (passing score is a 70%) and one of my friends even had to take the test seven times before passing.

Sorry for the rant.
- X